On tagging

OpenMeta is the most useful tool in my tagging toolbox. It allows me to attach tags to anything with a filesystem representation: websites, documents, photos, source code, emails and more. Before OpenMeta we had to make do with whatever fields Spotlight would search, which was Finder comments on files, and really no options on emails and other items accessed outside of Finder.

Now that we have OpenMeta¹ and a plethora of tools (I highly recommend Tags.app) to work with, tagging is a real option. We just have to figure out the best way to make use of it.

Things I’ve learned

The goal of tagging is to associate files into groups that wouldn’t be feasible using a folder hierarchy. As I’ve mentioned before, I still use a shallow hierarchy, especially for grouping project files together. The idea of “one big pile” is as frightening to me as it is to most people. I use tags to create additional groups that might not otherwise be possible, bringing together files and other objects that might be related in ways that a folder reflects.

The primary problem you run into is that tag collections get out of control, and navigating them isn’t any faster than drilling through folders and mailboxes. This happens because multiple forms of a tag are used, or long after the object is tagged the original associations are forgotten. I’ve learned this the hard way, and on multiple occasions.

There are two basic approaches to tagging:

1. Tag with anything and everything you could possibly associate with the object (file, email, photo, etc.). It’s a free-association tag-for-all that results in a huge collection of tags. This is navigable, but often results in messy tagging.
2. Tag sparingly, only using tags that will be easy to associate other objects with. Anything that is searchable in text or other metadata is left out of the tags. This is the method I’ve come to use.

What I’ve learned is to do follow three obvious-sounding rules: tag intuitively, intelligently, and consistently.

Intuitively

Drill down

I typically limit myself to three levels of tags. Top-level tags encompass an overall topic or broad scope that the object falls into. For example, if it’s a website, I tag it with the primary keyword that led me to the page, or the subject I was interested in when I followed the link. If it’s a project you’re working on, a client’s name is probably the right choice for a top-level tag. Tags such as “email,” “communication” or “research” aren’t top-level tags. If used at all, those are third-tier.

Second-tier tags divide the group into subsections. If your top-level tag is a client name, then second-tier tags would include a project name or other unique identifier that can be shared across all related files. If you consider your top-level tag specific enough for narrowing a project down in a future search, just skip to third-tier tags.

Third-tier tags are where you begin to cross-pollinate the tag groups. These tags are going to be common tags across multiple top-level groups. Tags like “research,” “approved,” “communication,” etc. can make sense here. This comes down to personal style. The only real rule is that they have to be tags you’ll consistently use elsewhere within other scopes. They’re what make this different from just using a folder hierarchy.

This pattern allows you to view your tag groups in a drill down fashion. If you tag with two or three levels, it increases the ease of browsing in various situations. If you were always going to look for a file as CSS3, you should just use a folder. It’s nice to be able to browse for all your web design articles, but maybe you’re just interested in the CSS articles at the moment. A search for bookmarks tagged “tutorial” and “CSS3” will quickly produce all of the relevant articles you’ve found in your web browsing.

Plus, you can cross groups: an article that covers html, javascript and CSS would get tags for all three, assuming I would be interested in all subjects in the future. If I dealt only in CSS, I wouldn’t bother tagging with the other topics, it would just pollute my tag collection.

Choose tags that will be useful next year

“What will I search for when I’ve forgotten this item exists?” It’s not always an easy question to answer. The basic rule is to take what first comes to mind and ask yourself that question. Is the first association you make related to current circumstances or events? You might not have that association in a year. You want to use tags that come to mind easily, but double-check yourself to make sure it will be as front-of-mind when the time comes to search.

For example, if it’s a website, tag it with the primary keyword that led you to the page, or the subject that you were interested in when you followed the link. If it’s a project you’re working on, a client’s name and the scope or project name are probably the right choices for top-level tags.

There are a lot of edge cases. You get better at it after you’ve had to deal with your own tags for a few years.

Intelligently

These are common sense rules that make tag collections work. You probably know them already (or have figured them out if you’ve been tagging for a while).

1. Don’t tag with data already available

   Unless your system has no other means of searching metadata, you can always add things like dates, filetypes and even content to your search to find specific files within a tag group.

2. Use lowercase tags. Always

   It gets messy if you’re inconsistent, and autocomplete will almost always substitute the first capital letter it comes across in a completion, resulting in your previously unused tag now being capitalized.

3. Don’t use “flagged” or other time sensitive tags

   This one needs some explanation. Unless you are religious about removing “tickler” tags as you go, find another way to denote importance of the tagged element. Finder labels work well for files, and you can keep a “Current” folder with things that need to be attended to. Once you’ve handled whatever needs to be handled, you file it (or send it to a script that will).

   I know this from experience. I tend to be pretty good at reviewing my systems, but the “flagged” and “important” tags got out of hand quickly. Pretty soon I was looking back at flagged files, emails, photos and bookmarks and I really had no idea why they were important anymore.

   In a best-case scenario, you’re using a project/task management solution that allows links. If I need to reply/follow-up on an email later, I drag it into my task manager and create a new task. That gets the flag, the due date, and any notes I need to remember why. I could tag/flag the email as well, but then I’d have to untag it later. This way I just check off the task. Side benefit: assuming you don’t delete completed tasks, you can find it later and follow the link as an easy bookmark.

Consistently

If a tag is used only once, you’re wasting your time. You could have found that file, page, calendar entry, etc. with Spotlight. You didn’t need a tag to do that.

Keep a list of common tags if you need to, at least until they become second-nature. Most of the tagging applications will show you common/recently-used tags when you’re tagging. The best thing in the world can be autocomplete, assuming your tag collection isn’t already a polluted mess. Autocomplete in tag dialogs means you don’t have to struggle to remember casing, plural forms, etc., just go with what you did before.

I generally try to avoid capital letters, hyphenation and plural forms. I’ll use multi-word tags frequently, but without punctuation or intercaps.

Exceptions

There are some obvious exceptions to these rules in my system. For example, I keep a list of things I want using a “tobuy” tag. I have to manually untag these things as I buy them or decide I don’t want them anymore. The tag works really well with Smart Folders in Finder, though, and I don’t have trouble keeping up with it. It’s not an area that changes rapidly; just a folder I can browse when I have some spending money and a shopping urge. On these occasions I just untag “tobuy” items as I go through them. It never gets out of hand and it never takes long to update. Unlike the “important” tag I used to use in all of my projects, “tobuy” is basically a top-level tag that I always search for across all topics and groups.

I also sometimes use questionable tags for scripting purposes. I prefer client→project folders to their redundant tag counterparts, mostly just because I’m going to separate those anyway for the sake of filing sanity. I’ll use client/project tags on files on my Desktop, though, and my scripts will automatically sort those tagged files based on their tags and subtags. It’s a bit of a complex system, but it lets me use my Desktop as a general bucket for everything I’m working on, and have the various elements from multiple projects all neatly filed at the end of the day. The filing tags can be removed by the script after they’ve found their home.

There are plenty more exceptions. I don’t think any two people’s tagging systems will be identical. It’s the beauty of tagging: you can build a system that works for you. It doesn’t have to be rigid, but some general, self-imposed rules can definitely make it a more useful process.

Related posts:

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2. AutoTag2: smarter tagging for TextMate and WordPress
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Originally posted on BrettTerpstra.com at Some suggestions for better tagging

This also means I’ll be writing in the Read & Trust newsletter, a weekly circulation that includes a long-form article from one of the Read & Trust writers. Subscriptions are $5/month, and you get exclusive content from some of the best writers in the blogosphere. Each month has a theme (e.g. Creativity, Quality vs. Quantity, Fear & Loss…) and the authors rotate each week (I’ll be up next week). Sign up and you won’t miss any of the great contributions from the Read & Trust writers!

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Originally posted on BrettTerpstra.com at Read & Trust

Steve Jobs and his work changed the course of my life. I’m grateful. Thank you, Steve.

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Originally posted on BrettTerpstra.com at Thanks, Steve

If you’ve read any of my writing or looked at any of my projects, you’re probably fully aware of the nerd wood I get for plain text. You know, the stuff that’s been around since the dawn of the computer and will still be around when there’s not an application left that can open a DOCX file. I have to admit, though, that there are some things I can’t–and don’t want–to do in plain text.

Plain text is good at storing pieces of information in a linear format. That’s what most of us do most of the time, so it’s a really fun (and potentially useful) thing to nerd out about. I do. A lot. But even among plain text fanatics there are always lines that have to be drawn. Some jobs require Microsoft Word for a final publication, sometimes an HTML email needs to be sent, hell, almost all of our Markdown–at some point–ends up as rich text for one purpose or another. The beauty of Markdown is that I can keep the source documents clean and just keep generating different output for different needs. That’s neat, and it’s what makes MultiMarkdown and apps like Marked so useful.

I don’t currently do any writing or work that requires anything other than a last-minute HTML conversion from text, so my line gets drawn a little further out. I even get away with sending raw Markdown in my emails (don’t judge, it’s really very readable and totally predictable cross-platform). The line for me, though, is at brainstorming.

It is, in my mind, impossible to effectively brainstorm in a text file. If you use a format that’s even slightly more flexible than a typewriter, you’ll get better results. A whiteboard, for example. A Moleskine you can doodle around in. In my case, mind maps. Hand drawn or created on the computer, concept map or mind map, it doesn’t matter. It beats text hands down.

Radiant thinking, as Tony Buzan coined it, is impossible to accomplish in a linear list format. A text file doesn’t allow you to continue multiple branches of thought simultaneously. Maybe if you had a dozen windows or split panes open in your editor and could jump around from section to section working on a bunch of indented markdown lists… but you’d still be less productive than I am in any mind mapping setting. I can almost guarantee it. I might be projecting, but I just don’t think the human brain works that way.

For me, it has nothing to do with pretty branch colors and tweaking font sizes. I’ll admit, if I’m presenting a map I like it to be pretty (maybe even stunning), but the number one reason I prefer the format is simply its structure. Jumping around from thought branch to thought branch, adding and extending idea nodes, I always find myself coming up with details and even new ideas that I know I wouldn’t have found if I’d just popped the initial idea into a text file.

Why am I writing this post? Hopefully to save someone else from wasting the time I spent pondering whether you really could do anything with text files. Turns out, at least for me, you can’t.

I’m okay with that, I really do love my mind maps.

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Originally posted on BrettTerpstra.com at When plain text is wrong

A Charter (my ISP) truck showed up outside of our house yesterday afternoon, ostensibly to work on a neighbors connection. Suddenly, the Internet was no more. As the truck drove away, a correlation was made, but it was too late. An immediate call to Charter, 10 minutes of “automated self-diagnosis” and a service rep in another State failed to bring the truck back. “Tomorrow, between one and three,” they said to my wife. I called back, irate, trying not to swear as it began to sink in that their customer service setup was simply a buffer to keep people like me from talking to anyone who could actually do anything. A fence to keep out the rabid dogs, I suppose.

What to do? I suppose we’ve tried to make the best of it. We went for a nice walk around our new neighborhood. We ate a home-cooked meal at the dinner table, which is a rarity. We retired to the living room and watched something my wife tells me is called a “DVD” on our sorely neglected XBox. I had forgotten we had either around.

That was all fine and good, but the next morning it really sunk in. I work from home which, as you can imagine (or well know), requires some connectivity to accomplish. Waking up without the Internet is neither convenient nor pleasant.

My wife, who has recently returned to college at our local University, was rear-ended last week (please, keep your mind out of the gutter). Her truck was totaled, and we let the insurance folks tow it away this weekend. So we have one car, and we live at the top of a very, very tall bluff. Biking to a coffee house is out of the question, and if she dropped me off in the morning before class, I wouldn’t be able to get back to the house during the much-anticipated service window.

Even my cell phone coverage is intermittent, usually boosted by a broadband-driven MicroCell. So I composed a brief explanation of the situation and waited for an Edge signal to show up so I could send it to my co-workers. Then, I had a cup of coffee on the porch and enjoyed the view.

I took a mid-morning nap, just because I could. Now, I’m writing a leisurely piece about the whole thing, but I still have three hours before the service window opens up, and potentially another two hours after that before anything is fixed. I will, obviously, survive. It’s been a stark reminder of how much my life really does revolve around the Internet, though.

Does it bother me that I’m so dependent on the “Cloud?” Not really. I’m a huge fan of the connectedness I feel online. I’m not very good at making and keeping friends in the real world. I don’t really want to be. For me, digital people are much easier to deal with. I’m also quite enamored with the conveniences of the Internet. Conveniences that as a child I never imagined would exist.

Out with my meat-world friends, I regularly use Shazam to identify a song. Then I use the web to learn more about the artist. Spotify instantly gives me a discography and we listen to our new-found artist on the way home. I smile the whole way, just because I never imagined this would be possible.

Debates at dinner are easily ended by my iPhone. Conclusive evidence is presented–complete with backup sources–in a matter of minutes. Information that may have taken a trip home–or even to the library (I think those are still around)–is easily garnered with a speed that would probably have resulted in burning at the stake not so long ago.

At home, my audio and visual entertainment depends upon online services. The catalogs of movies and songs at my fingertips is unfathomable, and I never take it for granted. I get a warm, fuzzy feeling when I think of a movie I want to see and am watching it five minutes later. A song pops into my head, often obscure, and without even being able to remember the title or the artist, I’m listening to it within seconds. Grin.

Now I’m here, without all of these things that I enjoy so much. I don’t like it, and would never claim that I find very much pleasure in being disconnected. Conversely, I do enjoy the unreachability sometimes. Do you remember when the web was a one-way conversation? The curmudgeon in me does occasionally long for that.

That doesn’t last long, though. Eventually, the urge to send a witty tweet and get a witty response arises, and it’s annoying to be unable to act on my impulses. It’s annoying to have to sit with a thought so long that I eventually realize it was neither witty nor worthy of sharing. I shudder to think how quiet the web would be if everyone had this much time to consider their actions.

Am I making the best of this situation? Yes. I’m thoroughly enjoying sitting on the back porch and watching the sky move from rain to sun, studying the traffic patterns of the cars in town–which look like Matchbox® cars from here–and breathing in real, honest-to-goodness clean air. Nothing beeping, buzzing or otherwise distracting me; it’s rather Zen. I know from camping trip experience that it takes at least 24 hours for me to really disconnect my brain. I’ll probably hit that point just as the Charter service tech shows up.

I could probably pontificate on this for another few hours, but I won’t. I’ll try to get some offline work done, then go back to the porch with another cup of coffee. I do apologize for the gap in my blogging schedule over the last few days. Work, Marked and nvALT all got in the way of doing the reviews I have planned. A WordPress/ifttt.com experiment gone horribly wrong on Saturday and now a 24-hour Internet outage (which I may have mentioned already) all conspired to keep this blog quiet. This will be remedied shortly.

Thanks for your patience, and we hope you’ll choose to fly with us again soon.

(As evidenced by this post, I am back online. Yay!)

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Originally posted on BrettTerpstra.com at An unintentional 24-hour Internet break

First, a “command central” for writing music, coding and fiddling. This has my Mac Pro with a dual-monitor setup, studio monitors, my Oxygen 49 and several mics, my acoustic, electric and bass guitars on a rack to the left and a lot of drawers for cables and additional gizmos (the Mac Pro there also runs the home automation and media servers). I can and will do my day job here, but this is the one I’m allowed to be chaotic at. It’s not that I’m not creative in a sterile (read minimal) environment, but the byproduct of my most creative moments is, well, chaotic surroundings. I’ve decided to just let that happen as it always has, but designate “concentration” spaces for my other two modes.

On the other side of my office is a nook with a small desk which has a keyboard drawer with a Bluetooth keyboard, Magic Mouse and a large Moleskine. There’s also a small lightbox. My MacBook Air sits in front of the lightbox, which is angled toward the wall, and I get a nice, empty desk with a comforting glow around my work area. This desk is for writing and nothing else. My brain is easily trained to accept certain reactions to certain spaces (e.g. bed for sleeping), so I think this will work well.

Lastly, the work-only space. On nice days in the warm 1/3 of the Minnesota year, I have an amazing outdoor office. It’s a small table in a small walled garden facing the heavily wooded area on the slope of the bluff. There are warm, yellow rope lights across the top of the area and the gate slides open to the back yard and woods. It’s pretty close to my definition of perfect. In the cold months, I have an extra space near my main office that I’ll be converting, but I won’t have to worry about that for another month.

I don’t really believe in being distracted. I believe that I procrastinate and create my own distractions, but my workspace rarely has anything to do with it. I have the job flexibility to be able to accept that my brain isn’t in a work mode at almost any time, take 15 minutes to read my RSS feeds or hack around, then get back to it. Once I’m in work mode, I get as obsessed with that as I do with my more creative pursuits. Of course, my job requires creativity, too, and I really couldn’t hold a job that didn’t. The minimalism in the auxiliary workspaces is more to help me keep my clutter contained than to prevent distraction. I think it’s going to work out great!

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Originally posted on BrettTerpstra.com at An office for every mode

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Originally posted on BrettTerpstra.com at Moving day

Anyone who’s read this blog, used my projects or has talked to me about anything nerdy for more than five minutes knows I’m a fan of Markdown. The question doesn’t come up often, but occasionally someone dares to ask–despite the apparent probability that it will lead to a lengthy explanation–why I use Markdown in so many of my workflows. I give just about the same response to seasoned nerds as I do to my not-so-computer-savvy friends. This isn’t the Markdown what, it’s the Markdown why…

It’s easy: the syntax is so simple you can barely call it “syntax.” If you can use an emoticon, you can write Markdown.

It’s fast: the simple formatting saves a significant amount of time over hand-crafted HTML tags, and is often faster than using a word processor or WYSIWYG editor. It speeds up the workflows of writers of all ilk, from bloggers to novelists.

It’s clean: Markdown translates quickly to perfectly-formed HTML. No missing closing tags, no improperly nested tags, no blocks left without containers. You also get 100% less cruft than exporting HTML from Microsoft Word. There’s no styling inline, nothing that will otherwise break a site’s design or mess with the XSLT formatting for PDF output. In short, it’s foolproof.

It’s portable: your documents are cross-platform by nature. You can edit them in any text-capable application on any operating system. Transporting files requires no zipping or archiving, and the filesize is as small as it can possibly get.

It’s flexible: output your documents to a wide array of formats. Convert to HTML for posting on the web, rich text for sending emails or importing into a layout program for final arrangement or any number of other proprietary formats.

It fits any workflow: You can make Markdown work with any workflow. It can speed up just about any writing-related process with very little setup. It can also be scripted all to hell, if you want, because plain text is the most flexible of any format known to computer-kind.

And there it is, my two-minute explanation. I’ll be printing this on T-shirts which will be available soon. No, not really. I’ll just keep making Markdown as easy as possible with Marked and nvALT (yes, shameless plugs).

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Originally posted on BrettTerpstra.com at Why Markdown? A two-minute explanation

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Originally posted on BrettTerpstra.com at Gratitude

The TUAW Dev Interviews

Thanks to everyone I met at WWDC this year and to the friends I got to see for a great time. San Francisco was as beautiful as ever and the Mac and iOS development communities are, as usual, full of new and brilliant ideas. It’s always heartening to see. TUAW and MacTech will be posting the result of our blogging work at WWDC over the next few weeks.

The Smile party was a blast, and thanks to Jean MacDonald and Smile for throwing such a great geekfest. The TUAW bash was a great time, too, and it was great to see some Apple employees show up (happens less often than you’d think). They were there with Daniel Jalkut, and it was great to finally meet him, too. Violet Blue, Jim Dalrymple, Manton Reese and more than I can remember right now, great to meet you all!

I’m headed back to Minnesota right now, and not looking forward to the two-hour drive I’ll be in for after landing. Then I’ll have about 5 days to get things in order at work, get nvALT 2.1 released and pack before I head off to a family reunion for almost a week. I seem to be moving around a lot for a grumpy homebody. Oh, well.

Feel free to browse my WWDC 2011 photos to see a bit of what went on.

Addendum

So I’m sitting and waiting for a tow truck to come start my car right now, and I realize I forgot to thank Victor Agreda, Jr.¹ who instigated most of these meetings, kept me alive and introduced me to In-n-Out Burger. Thanks, Victor!

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Originally posted on BrettTerpstra.com at Thanks WWDC

Eddie Smith on App Store prices:

It might sound weird coming from a non-seller of apps, but I like seeing higher prices in the App Store. If the market will support higher prices, that’s a really good sign that the App Store is becoming a quality marketplace, not just a snack machine.

I use both free and paid apps that are probably worth hundreds of dollars to me based on what they do for me. Value is worth paying for, and the more profit potential the App Store offers, the better development we’ll see in it.

I agree. I’ve put myself on an app budget lately, so I’m spending less overall. As a result, I find myself saving up for the $10+ apps rather than trying every ninety-nine cent app out there. A realistic price for excellent apps makes them more valuable to me, increasing both perceived value and my likelihood to continue using an app. They become less discardable.

This could backfire if all of the crappy apps out there start upping their price just to increase their perceived value. It only takes getting burned once on a $15 app to make you think you should just stick with the cheap stuff. The fact that some really valuable apps are made available for less than three dollars only makes this pitfall worse. If only there were a better try-before-you-buy system in place, and prices weren’t set so arbitrarily. I know that setting a price for your own app is a difficult decision. Maybe we need a cheat sheet for developers to determine the sweet spot for their app pricing.

My app:

• Farts: go to jail, do not pass go. Do not collect 99 cents.
• Is a less-useful mimic of an existing app: Divide the superior app’s price by 3. Stop here.
• Provides rudimentary entertainment: Add $.99
• Provides unique entertainment with a refined experience: Add $2.99
• Provides an experience that makes full use of iOS features: Add $2.99
• Provides a valuable portable experience that rivals or beats a similar desktop experience: Add $10.00
• Is a tool that syncs with a valuable desktop experience: Add $5.00
  • Syncs with a valuable desktop experience and adds utility appropriate to the mobile platform: Add another $10.00
• Blows the mind of your target demo: Add $20.00

There, your starter pricing cheat sheet. It needs some refinement and a more complete handling of edge cases, but the basic rule of thumb is: “Create good apps with intrinsic value and refined experiences, then value your app appropriately.” Your customers–at least most of us–will truly appreciate it.

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Originally posted on BrettTerpstra.com at A cheat sheet for App Store pricing

My wife, Aditi, gets 100% of the credit. She’s a Certified Professional Dog Trainer and has worked with the ASPCA doing dog assessments on military bases where they’ve instituted breed bans. She’s been working with Emma since we first adopted her a few years ago. She recently took her through somebody else’s class and then through the CGC test this evening. I do what I can, but not nearly enough. Nonetheless, I get coated in slobbery love daily.

So, here’s to Emma. May she live out her life as an ambassador for a maligned breed. In the meantime, we continue to run Minnesota Pit Stop, assessing and placing lost and surrendered pit bulls one at a time.

Check out Emma on Flickr. And don’t miss this shot: Emma balancing a full wine glass on her head. No strings.

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Originally posted on BrettTerpstra.com at Another pit bull proves her good citizenship

For the record, I know that the concept of minimalism doesn’t eschew necessary peripherals, but the desktop photos I’ve appreciated most did not have multiple monitors (or cables coming out of every available port). Since the day it was feasible, I’ve had two monitors on every computer I’ve owned. I know quite well how to make use of the extra space efficiently. I have trouble getting along without it. However, my last three computers have been laptops, and I get so used to using them with external monitors and peripherals that I have trouble using them as mobile computers. This frustrates me, and became the second motivation for this experiment.

The goal

What I wanted to do was see if I could get along with a single display for at least one month. I had previously swapped out my fancy keyboards for Apple’s bluetooth aluminum keyboard, which I have fallen in love with. The fact that its layout matches my MacBook Pro was a big deal, and once I got good with it, mobile computing became that much less awkward (obvious tip: the Function key [fn] is your friend). Next, I had discovered that the Magic Trackpad completely relieved my RSI. I was having wrist pain to the point where I could’t even work, and since getting the Magic Trackpad, I have had none. That’s a little off-topic, though. The point is that I had already “minimized” my peripherals, I just hadn’t done away with the second display.

The test

I got a HengeDock and set it up behind my primary display. This allowed me to hide my MacBook Pro from view and still have access to all of its ports. It worked pretty well, with a 24″ display, Bluetooth keyboard and trackpad. I did it for 6 weeks and thought I was getting used to it, for the most part.

The fail

The thing that bugged me the most was using CSSEdit, along with other programs where I want room to edit and room to preview at full size. Constantly swapping foreground windows is annoying to me. Annoying enough, in fact, that the experiment failed. I added a 23″ display to my setup using the newest Sewell USB-to-DVI adapter. It felt like, I don’t know, trying a drug after you’ve been clean long enough to forget about it. I was instantly at home with the situation, and once again wondering how I had lived without it. I did soon decide that two 20″+ monitors was more than needed, so I went back to my original configuration: my MBP on a stand next to my 23″ monitor. I plugged back in my Huey, my Drobo and LaCie Rugged clone drive, my USB speakers, my Oxygen 49 keyboard, my iPad and iPhone and a host of other peripherals. I feel at home now.

I did get better at using my laptop as a laptop, a very beneficial side effect, but I don’t think I will ever again skip the chance to plug in an additional display.

Oh, and despite my surname, I am actually more Irish than Dutch, so happy St. Patrick’s day to you!

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3. Geeklet: Top RAM Processes

Originally posted on BrettTerpstra.com at The one monitor experiment

Since posting my latest desktop, I’ve received a few questions about how I keep my Mac’s Desktop icons under control. I thought I’d answer that question before I got around to posting my whole GeekTool setup. Beyond hiding disk icons and making the icons smaller in Finder’s Desktop view settings, I have a “system.” My filing system is simple to use, but a little complicated to explain (and set up), so it gets a whole post to itself. I doubt many will follow directly in my footsteps, but you asked…

Like any so-called system…

The basic idea is that my Desktop is an inbox. During the day, I save just about everything I work on to my Desktop. Like any system I’ve ever used, the secret is actually doing the “reviews”. At the end of each day I do a scan and file what obviously has a place (I have some neat tricks for speeding that part up, but I’ll get there in a bit). Things that represent new projects or that don’t fit into an existing folder/tag setup take further action; if there are enough related items to represent a project or topic, they get collected into a new Desktop folder which is descriptively named. The new folders will generally stay on the Desktop until the weekend, when I do a Weekly Review. If a file is singular and has no context, it stays on the Desktop and waits for company. If a file sits alone for a few days, it usually ends up being tossed into a “pile” of similar filetypes. Let Spotlight sort ‘em out.

In the Weekly Review, I go through the new folders on the Desktop and determine what type of information they represent. Is it a project? A client? Reference material? I have a folder hierarchy based on these types, the top levels being Work, Code, Reference and File Cabinet. Each breaks down a couple more levels. If a Desktop folder can be filed into one of these categories, it’s moved there. Not before it’s tagged, though.

Tags, tags, tags

I use OpenMeta tags to sort and search all of my data. I primarily use Tags from Case Apps, Default Folder X and Spotlight, but make frequent use of HoudahSpot and the command line openmeta utility as well (among many other OpenMeta-compatible apps). I don’t stake the life of my data on the continued availability or stability of the OpenMeta system, but in combination with a consistent, shallow folder hierarchy, I know where things are, even without the convenience of tags. Tags make it easy to group files and work with those groups, but there’s more than enough metadata in the filesystem to make any information easy to locate with Spotlight or other mdfind tools.

The beauty of tagging, as you may know, is that you can easily assign multiple categorizations and topics to each item, rather than just having them exist at one location which defines it as a type or part of a static collection. I still use the shallow hierarchy of folders that drill down to individual projects and topics, so it’s not a “one pile” deal. I couldn’t function like that; it’s difficult to weed, and if metadata is lost, so is the file, essentially. I use folders to maintain filesystem sanity. I use tags and other metadata to maintain my sanity.

I also use tags on iCal events, emails, web sites and other elements of my system. They’re easy to filter in searches and allow me to make a project “folder” that contains more types of data than Finder would normally make convenient.

Tags, to me, are like mind maps, in that they work the way my brain does. Each tag creates a “nodal connection” to other items sharing the tag, and neural networks are formed by related tags. Things aren’t always directly connected, but the nodes make it possible to track things down after you’ve forgotten about them. They’re useful in the short term for gathering projects together and categorizing, but even more useful after you’ve forgotten you ever had a file and then suddenly need it.

What’s in a (tag) name?

The secret, which I’ve learned from a few years of doing this, is to tag intelligently, sparingly and consistently. Being liberal with tags like “important” or “flagged” just means more upkeep and reviews that have to be done to keep the tags relevant. While tags like “neat” or “supercool” seem silly to me, I use one “inspiration” tag on anything that I’m saving just because it’s, well, inspirational. I have a Smart Folder in Finder that pulls up everything with that tag, and then I can filter the files based on date, type, etc. If I add additional tags, they are pretty general, such as “color,” “webdesign,” or “productivity.” These are big buckets I can dive into when I need an idea, or a kick in the pants. The tags on project and research files tend to be more specific, and I can drill down to precise sets of files by typing a few words in Tags or HoudahSpot.

To keep the cruft down, I use tags which aren’t already defined by other metadata like the creation or modified date, the filetype, the filename, etc. I do tag files with the name of their parent project or topic, even though it’s often redundant to the folder hierarchy. This allows me to tie projects together across multiple folders, disks or even servers. Sometimes a file is more strongly tied to a topic than it is to an individual project. Say it’s a general reference item or a stock photo that I gathered while working on a specific project, but that I know I’ll need again. I put it into a reference folder or photo collection, and tag it with the related project. It’s easy to view it in the context of the project with a tag search, but part of a larger collection of similar items at the same time.

When in doubt, I usually choose tags based on the first thought that pops into my head. Chances are, when I’m looking for it again in a year, I’ll have the same thought. It doesn’t always work, but I’ve had a pretty good success rate over the last couple of years. As often as possible I try to reuse tags; a tag that reveals one or two files is a useless tag. My “Yearly Review” includes weeding out tags that have very few associated files, or that could be merged into more common tags.

Is this future-proof?

I know I started by saying I don’t depend solely on tags, and then went on to describe a system that sounds pretty tag-heavy. Given the somewhat unorthodox nature of OpenMeta tags, and Apple’s power to pull the rug out from under them at any time, it kind of seems like a disaster waiting to happen, right? The fact of the matter is that OpenMeta tags are well preserved by design, backed up¹, and can be re-associated with their files through various means, should the system ever fail. It’s really pretty solid.

The tags don’t translate to iOS, though, so that’s taken some extra thought in some cases. The tags I use in Simplenote/Notational Velocity, for example, are inline in the file as a special character followed by the tag name. I can set up Spotlight searches to search for a keyword with and without that prefix, so it doesn’t really add complexity to the system. Searching in Simplenote on my iPhone/iPad is then much easier. Spotlight and apps like Simplenote also search text content and filenames, and iOS apps don’t “talk” to each other very well anyway, so it’s not a huge deal at this point.

The cool part

Tagging files with a project name has an added benefit for me. I’ve built a system using some Ruby scripts, the CLI tool for OpenMeta, the mdfind command, Dropzone, Hazel and Tags.app. This is the truly “complicated” part. The system took a while to set up, and there was some tweaking early on, but it’s solid now and I rarely have to think about it. It just works.

When I file those Desktop folders each week, I add a special supertag to define them as “targets.” They get a unique project name or combination of names, and the target tag. Then they’re filed in parent folders which are also targets with unique names. The second level of target can have one more child level of targets to separate sub-projects or file types. These tag names do not have to be unique system-wide, only within their parent target tag. Within any of those folders, the files are tagged and finding them rarely actually requires going into the folders.

Now, during the daily review, I just use Tags.app to quickly tag files on the Desktop with whatever is appropriate, plus the name of the project or topic they’re associated with, and any subfolders I want them to reach. Then I can let Hazel pick them up, or drag them straight to my Filer destination in Dropzone. Both run a script which gathers all of the target folders on the system and starts drilling down to find the best matching tag or series of tags. Then, it moves the tagged file into the best-match folder, logs the action to a text file, and gives me a quick Growl notification letting me know what it decided.

That’s the system. I’m sure I left some questions unanswered, so feel free to ask again in the comments. As I said in the beginning, I don’t know if this kind of setup makes sense to other Mac users, but it’s served me well for years. I don’t lose files, I keep my filesystem tidy, and I stay relatively sane.

Here’s a mind map of the elements that went into this article. It seemed to make a nice summary of my long-winded diatribe.

Related posts:

1. Some suggestions for better tagging
2. AutoTag2: smarter tagging for TextMate and WordPress
3. A Bash function for Markdown bloggers

Originally posted on BrettTerpstra.com at On sorting, tagging and other nerdery

Earth

If this little world tonight
Suddenly should fall through space
In a hissing headlong flight,
Shrivelling from off its face,
As it falls into the sun,
In an instant every trace
Of the little crawling things -
Ants, philosophers, and lice,
Cattle, cockroaches, and kings,
Beggars, millionaires, and mice,
Men and maggots all as one
As it falls into the sun…
Who can say but at the same
Instant from some planet far
A child may watch us and exclaim:
“See the pretty shooting star!”

-Oliver Herford

Related posts:

1. An unintentional 24-hour Internet break
2. Fog In The Valley
3. A little rock and roll: Inconsequential Martyr

Originally posted on BrettTerpstra.com at The warmest, fuzziest scary thought